49ers' new stadium capacity grows as first seats go in

SANTA CLARA -- The San Francisco 49ers are installing the first seats at the team's new stadium -- and it turns out there will be more room for fans than previously thought.

Project officials revealed that the expected capacity at Levi's Stadium will be between 69,000 and 70,000, up from the long-planned estimate of 68,500. Construction supervisors on the ground said they were able to find space sprinkled around the stadium to squeeze in extra seats without changing the stadium's structure or seat sizes.

Though the Santa Clara stadium will be double the overall size of Candlestick Park, the capacity will be about the same and roughly average for an NFL stadium. It will expand to about 75,000 seats for special events such as the 50th Super Bowl in 2016, however.

Late Tuesday, the team held a ceremony to formally install the first of the 57,000 plastic red seats that will fill out the upper deck and the bulk of the lower bowl (the cushier club and luxury box seats come later). They feature the 49ers' logo and, of course, a cup holder.

Fremont resident Miranda Margheim and her son, Stephen, bought the licenses for $6,000 each to the first seats installed. The seats near the 10-yard line are in section 134, row 9, seats 5 and 6.

Seat licenses run $2,000 to $80,000 each in one-time costs, plus $850 to $3,750 for season tickets each year. Nearly 90 percent have been sold.

Miranda, who began watching the Niners on wooden seats at Kezar Stadium more than four decades ago, showed up to test out the seats while decked out head-to-toe in Niners gear.

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"It's comfortable. We don't have splinters" like at Kezar, she said. "It's nice and smooth and you can lean back."

Stephen, 54, noticed the lip on the seat. "It's got a little give to it," he said.

Although the steel, concrete, plumbing and electrical wires have been going in since the project broke ground 18 months ago, the finishing touches are now being installed. The scoreboards will start going in within two weeks, and the field should be planted by the start of 2014.

"None of this means anything without the seats," said Paraag Marathe, the 49ers' chief operating officer.

Crews in Hayward have spent five months making the seats, which cost $9.8 million. Construction workers will now spend three months -- 17,000 man hours -- working from the top of the stadium toward the field, methodically taking the seats out of their cardboard boxes and using power drills to bolt them to rails.

Project co-director Robert Rayborn said there's "no doubt" the $1.3 billion stadium, which is 68 percent complete, will be ready by the end of July as planned.